Remember that alleyway in Santa Monica with Westside Comedy Theater? The one that's just dying to have a bar put in next door? Well, I revisited it.
Alleyways are such a restrictive form of urban design — they separate + compartmentalize the "uglier" functions of the city, i.e. trash collection, and unwittingly create creepy, crime-ridden dead zones in the process: a telltale sign of an unhealthy monoculture. Cities like New York or Paris mix things up more, putting smaller batches of trash out in the open for more frequent pickups. Their streets may smell a little more ripe, but they're still nothing compared to the rank, concentrated fumes lurking in LA's cesspool alleyways. Distributing functions more evenly across the urban system (even the smellier ones) would reduce restrictions on what alleys can + can't be used for. And it would also literally open up miles of fresh real estate for entrepreneurs to play with. So with that in mind, I installed a bar next door to this comedy club: the Cabo Cantina, transplanted from just one street over on the 3rd Street Promenade. Hellooo, fun! See it bar-ified!
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